It's hard these days to muster much interest in the World Trade Organization. Locked for years in rounds of negotiations leading nowhere, the body seems to have outlived its usefulness. Another big gathering of trade ministers ended in deadlock in Buenos Aires last week. You might wonder: Why bother?
The answer is that liberal trade, second only to capitalism, is the most powerful engine of economic prosperity the world has ever seen -- and governments could use the WTO to advance living standards across the globe. Led by the U.S., that's what they did in the decades after 1945. Without an international commitment to free trade, though, the institution is doomed to irrelevance.
